Burton Mocks Wilson With Modest Proposal--Make Poverty a Crime
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SACRAMENTO — Gov. Pete Wilson’s sharpest legislative critic, his tongue only partly in his cheek, proposed bills Tuesday that would make it a felony to be poor.
“I’m facetious and I’m not,” said state Sen. John Burton (D-San Francisco), a liberal Democrat. “The governor’s basic philosophy is that people are poor because they want to be poor. So in order to discourage people from being poor, we would make it a crime.”
His bills would make it a crime to live on an income below the federal poverty level or have a child while living in poverty.
The bills also would establish a state orphan asylum to house the children of poor people.
“They [the poor] would become middle class and wealthy as a result of that legislation,” he said.
“A guy would wake up in the morning . . . realize that being poor is a crime, tinker around in the garage a little bit, start a computer company and become a millionaire,” Burton said.
Burton, then an assemblyman, introduced similar legislation last year after hearing House Speaker Newt Gingrich’s proposals to change the national welfare system. Those bills quickly died.
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